


Of Theoretical Time Travelers and Gravitational Pulls

by CounterfeitBravado



Series: For All the Things My Eyes Have Seen, the Best by Far Is You [1]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: (sort of...) - Freeform, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Childhood Friends, Alternate Universe - Time Travel, F/F, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, childhood AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-01
Updated: 2017-10-01
Packaged: 2019-01-07 17:14:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,616
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12237216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CounterfeitBravado/pseuds/CounterfeitBravado
Summary: Maggie’s seen a lot of things throughout her life, from burning worlds and war-torn nations to indescribable miracles and profound wonders.But nothing could have possibly prepared her for meeting Alex Danvers./ /In which Maggie Sawyer travels the multiverse, equipped with her set of ideals and witty comebacks, and Alex Danvers walks in and rattles her to the core.





	Of Theoretical Time Travelers and Gravitational Pulls

**Author's Note:**

> A quick note on timelines: 
> 
> Time isn’t exactly “linear” in this fic. Not in the traditional sense of the word. Being that, based on the multiverse theory, different Earths travel at different speeds. For example, one Earth could be at 1990, full on with butterfly clips and jelly bracelets, while another could be at 2001, complete with Avril Lavigne (pre-clone, of course) and flare jeans. Let’s say a person is traveling from the first Earth, 1990, to the second, 2001-- it doesn’t mean they’ve aged eleven years, it means they were placed in a new terrain that did. That probably didn’t make any sense. Let’s hope it does.

 

Earth 11- 1935

 

“You look real funny there, Mister.”

 

Maggie swings her feet that hover over the ground, her arms extended by her sides to keep her from falling off of the fence. The man in question lifts his head, discombobulated. Maggie figures he would be after coming out of the woods lining the outskirts of her family’s farm like that.

 

The man straightens up, eyebrows furrowing. His eyes sweep Maggie’s appearance. It’s an inquisitive glance at most and Maggie notices how he pays specific attention to her clothes. Maggie tugs at the hem of her neckline in response.

 

“Lost or something?” She tries.

 

The man in front of her looks down at the device in his hand, the one that’s smoking and looking a lot like it’s lost the ability to do what it was made for. He curses under his breath.

 

“I think so…” The man says slowly, pocketing the device in the space in front of his… suit? It isn’t really anything Maggie’s seen before. It’s a red thing that’s got a pouch hanging from the back and doesn’t look all too comfortable with the way it sticks to him. But there’s a little golden lightning bolt stitched to the front and Maggie thinks that’s pretty cool.

 

“What’s your name?” Maggie hops off the fence and makes her way towards him slowly, moving in a decisive manner so that she won’t scare the man away.

 

“Um…” There’s a look of reluctance on his face before he sighs and shakes his head. “Barry. Barry Allen.”

 

/ /

 

Earth 38- 2016

*Fifteen years after Earth 11- 1937*

 

It was Barry Allen that had first given her the device.

 

From which world that Barry was from, or how long ago the transaction had occurred, Maggie doesn’t have a clue. Years of the same charade has chipped away at her memory, leaving not much other than hazy beginnings and foggy remembrances.

 

Still, Maggie knows three things to be fact.

 

One; the device in hand projected her to different Earths.

 

(Earths where time was stuck in the 18th century, Earths where there was no planet to see at all, Earths where everyone hyperfocused on time, and Earths where the concept had yet to be created.)

 

Two; she’s looking for something.

 

(What that something was, she wasn’t all too certain of anymore, the memory of the objective fading with the rest of them.)

 

Three; she’s a detective on this Earth.

 

(One of the finest at NCPD and, at least, as long as the scene interests her, she plans on keeping up the persona.)

 

Maggie knows those three things to be fact and a multitude of others to be continuously changing between Earths.

 

 _Leather_ is a thing here, not so much as it was on Earth 9 during the late 70s, but enough that Maggie’s got a few jackets in her closet to fit in style-wise. The internet is a thing also, which, growing up in a town and having stayed on Earths where the invention had yet to be introduced, Maggie is happy about. The technology on this Earth isn’t as profound compared to others she’s been on, but she’s able to do her job without much complication, so it works out well.

 

Maggie’s seen a lot of things throughout her life, from burning worlds and war-torn nations to indescribable miracles and profound wonders. But nothing could have possibly prepared her for meeting Alex Danvers.

 

The agent storms up to her on a routine day. Her forensic team’s just finished collecting their materials from the tarmac after an alien (because, yes, there are aliens on this Earth, and their existence is much more prominent than most Earths she’s visited) had attacked the president.

 

Alex approaches her with a steady bravado and a,  _What the hell do you think you’re doing on my crime scene?_ , and Maggie feels a spark of something inside her. She fights back with some line about bad movies and Quantico, and it serves to work up the agent and distract Maggie from noticing how her hair reflects the sunlight, or how she finds familiarity in those hard-set eyes.

 

Maggie’s squirming inside, feeling something so completely _different_ about this interaction compared to those she’s had, and she’s not all too sure if it’s a bad thing or not.

 

Needing an exit, she flashes a grin towards the taller woman and makes one for herself with a head tilt and a haste, “See you around, Danvers.”

 

/ /

 

Earth 11- 1936

 

Barry Allen stays for dinner that night and spends the next year in the abandoned barn on the Sawyer’s farm.

 

After the schoolhouse lets out, Maggie would often visit the strange man, bearing bread, water, and stories of the day-- going on and on about unfair teachers and her classmate, Alex Danvers. In return, he’d help her answer her science homework in binary code (to which, at first, Maggie’s teacher had turned her nose up to, but in a small act of rebellion, Maggie had kept doing) and told tales of his own-- farfetched marvels of adventures through universes and a recurring character of a woman named Iris West.

 

Barry would draw diagrams of Earths (yes, multiple, as he claimed there was such a thing as a “multiverse”) in the pages of Maggie’s English notebook and work on his little device that was still just as broken as the day he came.

 

Little by little, Maggie came to like his company, finding his odd way of speaking and his fanciful ideas enjoyable-- a little multiverse in themselves, containing ages of wisdom and _life_ for a seemingly young man.

 

“So he’s a time traveler?” Alex asks her one day when the pair is sitting in the town library. She’s got her long, dark red hair plaited down her back and Maggie can’t help but want to tuck away the strands that have escaped the braid, but she refrains herself, knowing full well what not to do in public.  

 

“Kind of. He calls himself a hero. But he was pretty reluctant to use the word.”

 

“Is he?”

 

“ _I_ think he is.”

 

“So why does he need the device if he’s fast enough to run through the universes himself?”

 

“He said something about specific Earths or something. I don’t think he can control where he lands on his own. Not too accurately at least.”

 

“And where did he say he was from again?”

 

“Some place called Central City.”

 

Alex sifts through the atlas in her hands.

 

“Don’t bother, it’s not in there.”

 

“And you let this man just… stay at your farm?”

 

“He fixed our stove.” A shrug. “My parents like him okay.”

 

“They don’t know he’s there, do they?”

 

“Not even a little.”

 

“Why choose Blue Springs though? If I were him, I’d want to get as far away from this place as possible.” Alex says it with a hint of longing in her tone.

 

“His device broke while he was trying to fix this timeline… thing. He made this ‘pocket’ in time in his universe but it didn’t turn out so well. He was trying to fix it but got stuck here.” At Alex’s confusion, Maggie shakes her head. “Barry explained it better.”

 

Alex hums, her eyebrows furrowed into a small frown. “Do you believe him?”

 

“I want to. Sounds kind of spectacular, doesn’t it? Different worlds and such.” Maggie nudges her shoulder affectionately, a smile spreading onto her face.

 

At this, Alex grins and shifts closer, lacing her hands through Maggie’s and giving it a squeeze. Her hands are warm, the edges of her palms slightly calloused from how tight she holds on when going through the jungle gym, and soft everywhere else that Maggie holds on almost gingerly.

 

“Yeah. It kind of does.”

 

/ /

 

Earth 17- 1916

*Four years after Earth 11- 1937*

 

Maggie lands in a warfield, in a large expanse of men in trenches covered in mud and dirt and grime, and she fumbles to spark the device to life once again, ignoring the ear-splitting scream of a young boy, and gritting her teeth as not to go forward and try to help in some way.

 

/ /

 

Earth 38- 2016

 

Maggie calls her after an hour of internal debate and banging her head down on her desk.

 

She takes Alex to the alien bar and watches her fumble for her gun and fumble over Roltikkon facts and it, in turn, makes Maggie fumble for stability.

 

She gains her footing again two meetings later.

 

Alex is dressed in a blue dress and she’s waving her hands around, so Maggie takes them in hers, ignoring how the other girl’s eye goes straight for their interlocked fingers and wills them to confess.

 

Alex’s hands are warm, the edges of her palms slightly calloused from how tight she holds on when going for her gun, and soft everywhere else that Maggie holds on almost gingerly.

 

Maggie grounds herself in the foreign feeling of familiarity and doesn’t let go.

 

/ /

 

Earth 11- 1936

 

The pair of them is sitting in the town’s park, the absence of the sun casting them in a field of supposed privacy.

 

Alex is staring intently at the journal in her hands, eyes wide at the new theory that presented itself in her hands. The theory was actually published the year before, but being that they live in a small town with an even smaller interest in science, Alex hasn’t been able to find it until now.

 

(It was hidden under a pile of newspapers in the grocer’s, buried as if its existence would too be erased as its visibility was.)

 

Maggie sits comfortably, her head resting on Alex’s shoulder, the position almost peaceful enough to doze off to.

 

In a moment of excitement, Alex shoots forward with a small exclamation, leaving Maggie to steady herself on the bench before her head succumbed to gravity.

 

“Jesus, Danvers,” Maggie mumbles, pushing herself upright once more. “Little warning next time would be nice.”

 

Alex turns to face her, eyes sparking, nearly vibrating with excitement.

 

“The multiverse!” She exclaims. “I-It’s true-- real. It’s real.”

 

The taller girl thrusts the journal into Maggie’s hands, pointing frantically at the pages. She begins pacing in front of Maggie, hands gesturing wildly everywhere.

 

“Erwin Schrodinger.” She begins. “He states that the more a particle is observed, the less naturally it behaves.”

 

Maggie raises an eyebrow at the words. “Meaning…?”

 

“He wrote about _superposition_ , this quantum mechanic that basically states that a particle can exist in all its theoretically possible states at the same time. I-it’s incredible. He made this-this thought experiment to help people understand it- let’s say you have a cat.”

 

Alex rushes into a topic and pauses to collect her thoughts, chewing silently on her lip as she places them in a cohesive order.

 

“You… you put it in this sealed box for an hour with a vial of some deadly gas, a Geiger monitor, a hammer, and some radioactive substance. There’s a chance that radioactive substance, or, uh, one of its atoms at the least, is going to decay and release radiation, and an equal chance that it won’t. Let’s say it does-- the monitor picks up the radiation sometime within the hour, triggers the hammer, a-and breaks the vial, releasing the poison gas and killing the cat.”

 

Maggie hyper-focuses on the girl’s words to try and puzzle them together. Her efforts yield varying success.  

 

“So…” Maggie furrows her eyebrows, moving to the edge of the bench, subconsciously inching towards Alex. “A fifty-fifty chance that the cat is alive or dead?”

 

“Exactly. Thing is, you don’t know that until you open the box, and until you do, the… thing, the… experiment’s got this superposition linked to it. At that moment, the cat is _simultaneously_ dead and alive. But the superposition’s got to end somewhere.”

 

Maggie nods along, only really understanding the half of it, distracted by how the other girl’s got stars shining in her eyes.

 

“And it does-”

 

“When you open the box.”

 

“Right,” Alex confirms. “You open the box to see the result. But here’s the thing-- when we observe the results, we _create_ it, and… um… it…”

 

She scratches at her wrist in her frustration, stuttering in her haze to get all the knowledge out.

 

“It _collapses_. The experiment falls privy to this reality or the next. It’s the radioactive particles inside the box that really determine the experiment. W-w-what’s happening in that hour, in the box, is that those atoms are both decayed and not decayed-- it’s a quantum object, that’s just how they react.”

 

“So what of the cat?”

 

“That’s the thing, a cat isn’t a quantum object, it’s like us-- it obeys Newtonian Laws that subject it to being _either_ alive _or_ dead. It just… _can’t_ be both at the same time. The two sets of laws can’t reconcile, yet when you stick the cat in the box and let them interact, a whole new process is created. The only way to see the reaction is to, again, open the box and end the superposition.”

 

“And the multiverse?” Maggie asks, pulling Alex away from her tangent.

 

“The multiverse solves the experiment. It’s got this thing linked to it that states that in one universe, the cat is alive, and another, dead. These worlds though, these universes, they all travel in the same trajectory and follow a similar set of rules. The multiverse is messy and impossible to equate, but each different world is existing together in a big ball of reality. There’s not one world that’s truer than any other. Making it so-”

 

“That the cat _can_ simultaneously be dead and alive,” Maggie says the sentence slowly, to which the other girl nods enthusiastically.

 

“Exactly! And i-it just shows that Newtonian objects, normal things, people like you and me-- we can choose whether to follow another set of laws, and our choice comes from our belief or nonbelief of the theory. We…”

 

Alex lets out a laugh that’s filled with wonder and excitement.

 

“We’re quantum, Maggie. And it’s goddamn brilliant.”

 

Maggie lets her lips stretch into a grin. She notices the slight breathlessness in the taller girl, her cheeks tinged pink, and in the haste of the moment, Maggie lurches forward, forgetting the public, and kisses her.

 

/ /

 

Earth 38- 2016

 

“Ever thought of quitting, Danvers?”

 

“What, the DEO?”

 

Maggie shrugs and nods.

 

Alex takes a deep breath in and releases it in a puff of air. “Not really. The DEO… it’s  helped me more than I could even put into words.”

 

“Never even gave thought to doing anything else? Or imagining yourself in some other field?”

 

“Having a midlife crisis, Sawyer?” Alex teases with a grin.

 

Maggie rolls her eyes fondly and nudges the other girl. “Answer the question, Danvers.”

 

“Um… I guess I have. In some world where aliens can peacefully live amongst humans and assholes aren’t… well, assholes. That’d be nice, I guess. Not having to worry about getting shot at is definitely a plus. Ever heard of the multiverse theory?”

 

Maggie almost laughs at the irony but manages to hold it back, though unable to contain a smile. “I’ve heard a few things about it.”

 

“The other Alex Danvers’ can live peacefully for me. I can take one for the team.” She grins, raising her bottle and lifting it to her lips.

 

Maggie wonders if it’s selfish for her to go on like this, inserting her narrative in places it doesn’t belong all for a goal she’s long forgotten. She wonders if it’s selfish to want to stay specifically in this world, one where Alex Danvers looks at her like she’s got the answer to life in her eyes and salvation on her lips, one where she’s stealing the existence of another person who’s like her but isn’t, one where the thought of quitting is becoming more and more tempting.

 

( _Of course you can quit! Quit anything you want, if you change your mind about doing it,_ and, _Did you ever consider, Don, that it might not be so easy to quit, after all? That you might not just settle right down to the life of a normal human being?_ )

 

She flushes the thoughts away with a swig of beer and the promise of good company.    

 

/ /

 

Earth 5- 2003

*Right after Earth 11- 1937*

 

Maggie hits the ground hard, tripping through the portal in her hurry to rush through it, and braces herself with extended arms and eyes shut tight.

 

She’s wearing her riding pants and an old pair of her dad’s button-ups that are only slightly too large on her, rightfully assuming that they would be much more comfortable to move in than a dress.

 

Maggie picks herself up off the ground and immediately wishes she hadn’t when she’s hit with an insistent wave of pain in her head.

 

The device displaced her, sending her to a different universe, but nowhere near the position she was in back in her own world. Barry said it would do that until he calibrated it properly, but it didn’t matter to Maggie that it did, she just needed to get out.

 

“You look like you just came from the Ren Fair,” a voice echoes in the darkness around Maggie.

 

She turns around to face a girl maybe a few years older than her, leaning her back against a tree, a cigarette hanging from her lips. Taking it between two of her fingers, she drops it on the ground, crushing it under her heel as she walks towards Maggie.

 

Maggie stiffens at the approaching girl, going to pocket the device quickly.

 

The girl stops in front of her with an odd smile on her face and shifts her gaze to Maggie’s hat.

 

“Now _this_ is adorable,” she says, lightly flicking the rim. “What’s your name, kid?”

 

“Maggie,” the younger girl answers in a small voice, tilting her head to look up at the girl.

 

“And what the hell are you doing out at this time of night?”

 

“I’m looking for someone.”

 

“Lost your parents or something?” The girl smirks, finding humor in her own words.

 

Maggie shakes her head.

 

“I’m looking for Alex. Alex Danvers.”

 

/ /

 

Earth 38- 2016

 

Alex kisses her in the bar, tugging Maggie back into the gravity that’s already so hard to fight and succumbs both of them to its pull.

 

It’s soft, so, so soft, and so desperate and filled with a type of hope that Maggie never thought would be associated to herself, and if this was anyone else, Maggie would kiss her back-- lurch forward in her space and hold their face in her hands and pour every emotion into a kiss.

 

But this is Alex Danvers. The woman who came out for her, the woman who makes her rethink everything, the woman that, instead of lurching forward, has her scuffing the toe of her shoe on the floor and finding fascination in the pattern of the wooden tiles.

 

She pulls away with a restraint she congratulates herself for and spews on about _different places_ , and _fresh off the boat_ , all the while pleading for Alex to understand her with unspoken pleas of _stay, please stay and I will explain all the things I know and how you are worth more than to be pulled into the life that I lead._

 

Alex doesn’t hear past the first set of words, past the woman she’s infatuated with breaking her heart, and Maggie can’t very much blame her so she points fingers to herself for putting that expression on Alex’s face.

 

/ /

 

Earth 11- 1937

 

Two things happen in result of Maggie’s action, or rather, one thing happens during the action, and it sparks a few more.

 

Eliza Wilke sees the two girls kissing in the dark, touches gentle, faces pulling away with a grin, and observes them more intently from then on. She puts two and two together after a year of watching the two who are undoubtedly in love with each other.  

 

The next night of Eliza’s conclusion, Maggie is running towards Barry, the angry shouts and life-threatening warnings of her father following her as she pounds at his door in the dead of night, hoping to find a safe haven in the man’s inclusive views.

 

He opens the door with bleary eyes that sober up at the sight of the unruly girl.

 

Under the collapsing roof and the faint scent of shaving cream, Maggie falls asleep with tears in her eyes and scrapes on her palms to his stories of heroes loving men and heroines loving women, and longs, now more than ever, that she lived in his state of existence in other worlds.

 

/ /

 

Earth 38- 2017

 

Alex throws herself in front of a bullet meant for Maggie and all Maggie feels is anger.

 

Maggie flicks Alex lightly on her arm, the one that isn’t bandaged and wrapped in white, and Alex gives her a crooked smile with a promise of, _I’d do it again in a heartbeat_ , and Maggie feels her own heart give way.

 

She spends the night in Alex’s ward on the uncomfortable wooden chair that lies by the bedside, twiddling with her phone, forcing herself not to notice how Alex’s jaw twitches in her sleep, or how her hair splays around her in a halo of red ocean waves, and instead, pulls the device out of her pocket and lets her thoughts drift to how easy it would be to leave the confusion behind.

 

“What’s that?”

 

Maggie jolts at the voice and turns to its owner. Supergirl stands at the open door, eyes staring intently at the device in Maggie’s hands, eyes flashing with a hint of recognition.

 

“Oh, it’s um… nothing really.” Maggie tucks it out of sight once again and Supergirl takes the words as an invitation to enter the ward.

 

The blonde looks at her in a way that has Maggie feeling exposed. She squirms in her seat.

 

“Something’s different about you, Detective Sawyer.”

 

“And here I was thinking Alex only spoke good things about me.”

 

Supergirl smiles at that, shaking her head in amusement as she uncrosses her arms and uses them to lean back on the glass walls.

 

“I wouldn’t worry about that. Agent Danvers cares a lot about you.”

 

Maggie shrugs in response, her eyes drifting to the sleeping agent.

 

“Does that scare you?”

 

Something in Maggie sparks to life at the words, but she snuffs it down because _yes_ , yes it truly does. She doesn’t remember being more frightened by anything than Alex Danvers. Maggie shrugs again, turning to face the heroine.

 

Supergirl’s got her eyes focused on Maggie.

 

“My friend’s got one those devices.” She points towards Maggie’s pockets, tapping her temple with a sheepish smile as an explanation. “X-ray vision.”

 

Maggie feels as though there’s gravel in her throat.

 

“You’re not from here, are you? And not in the way I’m not.” Supergirl takes her silence as affirmation and lets out a deep breath, pushing off of the walls. “I meant what I said, Detective. You mean a great deal to Alex, and well, Alex means a great deal to me. Don’t hurt her, Maggie. She’s tough, but there are some things that no one can tough through.”

 

/ /

 

Earth 11- 1935

 

“I did it out of love.”

 

“Funny, didn’t feel very loving to me…” Maggie grumbles, nudging Alex with her shoulder.

 

Alex smiles, retaliating with a nudge of her own, “Next time I’ll be sure to do it over a candlelit dinner then.”

 

It’s comments like these, which Alex has recently been making a lot, that confuse Maggie. She’s honestly not sure if the girl is waiting for her to confirm something, then humiliate her in front of the town, or if Alex feels the same way she does.

 

She doesn’t know which one is more frightening.

 

The pair amble over to her barn. Her father’s constructing a new one closer to the house so the old one stands, wasting away with leaks in the roof and a broken hinge on the door.

 

The snow lay itself thick that day and every step is a herculean effort, complete with boots caught in the snow, and slow steps to avoid slipping.

 

With a surprising yelp, Alex trips and falls face first into a bed of it, groaning as she flips herself onto her back.

 

After a quick inspection of the girl, Maggie lets out a laugh, earning herself a jab to the back of her knee, serving to buckle her forward and into the snow as well.

 

“That’s low, Danvers.”

 

“It’s your genes that made you short, Sawyer. I only serve to exploit them.” Alex winks, sprawling out in the white expanse. “Can we just… stay here a while?”

 

Maggie lets out an exaggerated sigh, complying to her friend’s wishes. She falls back next to Alex, a puff of fresh snow flying in all direction, staring up at the cloudless sky. She should’ve worn more layers when she went out that day…

 

“Maggie?”

 

“Hmm?”

 

Alex turns to face the shorter girl, propping herself up on an elbow, an unfamiliar look in her eyes. She shifts closer and moves her other hand to fiddle with the frill of Maggie’s top.

 

“Can I… Can I kiss you?”

 

Maggie’s heart beats wildly at the question, her mind blanking, unable to think with Alex _so close_ to her, looking down at her with that look in her eye. She feels herself nodding and Alex is leaning in and it’s frightening, but, _oh_ it’s so _goddamn beautiful_ at the same time.

 

/ /

 

Earth 38- 2016

 

It doesn’t snow in National City.

 

Maggie doesn’t very well understand why this bothers her in a deeper level than just… preferring places with snow, but it does.

 

(Early memories of snow days and snowball fights, powder in her hair, sleds and snow angels.)

 

It’s near Thanksgiving when the temperature drops in National City, cold though not nearly cold enough for snow to fall from the sky.

 

It’s the weather that Maggie focuses on when she’s shot in the shoulder with a laser.

 

A quick, _Just get the bastard_ , to National City’s heroine and she’s left to throw her head down, stare up at the ceiling, and think about how she should’ve worn more layers when she went out that day.

 

She drugged and borderline delusional when Alex stitches her up, but conscious enough to tease a quick, _You’re a doctor now too, Danvers?,_ to which she receives a wink and a jest of, _I dabble_. And Maggie’s definitely aware enough to listen to listen when Alex says she’s comfortable with her new normal.

 

Never in all her existence has Maggie ever been afraid of dying, of death in general, then storms in Alex Danvers with her short red hair and wicked grin, and shakes Maggie to the core of her very person, instilling such a deep sense of panic in her.

 

Maggie kisses her, hands shaking, desperate, with a, _We should kiss the girls we want to kiss_ , and she does. She really, really does. Maggie rocks forward, hands going to Alex’s face, feeling warmth radiating through her body, a sense of new wonders and a whole new terrain mapping themselves out and all Maggie wants is to stay a while to see where they go.

 

Alex has got stars in her eyes and Maggie feels like she’s going to explode.

 

“So you’re saying you like me. That’s-that’s what I got.”

 

Maggie can’t keep the laugh in her, so she lets it out through a wide grin and a, “Of course. You’re not gonna go crazy on me, are you?”

 

Alex is nodding, hands clasped together under her chin, “Probably, yeah.”

 

  
Then Alex is leaning back in and Maggie can swear this ( _this)_ , is what she is meant to do.

 

/ / 

 

Earth 11- 1937

 

She spends the school day hiding out in the abandoned barn with Barry, silently watching the scientist mumble to himself and fiddle with numerous tools.

 

“Any progress?”

 

Barry looks up from his work at the words, the first the little girl had said all day. He clears his throat, “Uh, yeah, actually. It’s actually pretty much done. Just have to work on this _tiny_ issue where it may leave parts of my body behind. And fix how it’d displace my position.”

 

“Where are you going to go?”

 

Barry furrows his eyebrows, swallowing audibly. “There are a few things I messed up that I need to fix. But I want to go back first. Back home.”

 

Alex runs in at that moment, eyes worried when they land on Maggie. “You weren’t at school today. It wasn’t until lunch when I heard what Eliza did.”

 

Barry looks between the two of them and makes his way to wait outside silently, wanting to give the two privacy.

 

Maggie stares at Alex, soaking the taller girl in-- trying to memorize her hair and the shade of her eyes and the way her laugh sounds better than Duke Ellington’s latest composition. Alex approaches her and Maggie pulls her in, hands at the other girl’s waist, wrapping around to engulf her in a grounding hug. She tucks herself in the crook of Alex’s neck and tries to remember that she smells of lilacs and the pages of an old book.

 

“Alex?” She whispers, voice quiet to preserve the air between the two of them. “The multiverse. It’s real, right?”

 

“Yeah, Mags. It is.”

 

Even as she says it, Alex is afraid of confirming it. She fully knows what will follow-- a time in which Maggie will turn to that device and to the multiverse for a source of comfort and warmth when she is _right there_ , when Maggie will leave all thoughts of worry and discomfort in this Earth for the promise of a new world that can’t possibly treat her worse than this one did, and Alex will lose her before she’s even gone.

 

But she says it anyway because she knows it’s what Maggie needs to hear, and instead of protesting, instead of screaming, instead of pleading, _please, please stay and I will explain all the things I know and how you are worth more than to be led to believe we are anything other than beautiful,_ Alex clings tighter to her, and wills the other girl to remember.

 

Alex knows she’s right when Maggie kisses her like it’s farewell and she blinks back tears as she heads back to her house, realizing that her home is going to be gone by morning.

 

Still, she returns to the barn before school, hoping, wishing, wanting, for Maggie to be there with her crooked smile and always untied sneakers, but instead, she finds Barry with his head in his hands and he’s apologizing and, _she ran off with it before I woke up_ , and, _it’s not even fixed-- it’s going to steal bits of her limbic system every time she uses it_ , _she'll lose her memory_ , and, _No, she’ll remember_ me, and a look of pity is being directed at her.

 

“She’ll remember.” She insists on her way out, her voice breaking. “She promised she would.”

 

/ /

 

Earth 38- 2017

 

Maggie wakes early, sleep never really coming to her at all in the night, and watches the steady rise and fall of breath of the woman next to her. She traces patterns into the agent’s skin, barely there touches and whispers of contact as not to wake the other woman from her slumber. Still (because of course), it’s enough that Alex shifts in her sleep and blinks awake.

 

A lazy smile stretches onto her face and Maggie can’t help but lean forward and kiss the woman in front of her.

 

It's in this moment that Maggie thinks she’s found it, what she’s spent so long looking for, because though she’s got no solid proof that it is, what would be the point in going out to search for something when all she needs is red hair and wit and intelligence and warm brown eyes?

 

“Tell me what it’s like,” Alex whispers.

 

Maggie starts sharing the tales of her adventures, of jumping through universes and learning what happens when serpentine men get raised on high thrones, and what results in the actions of women with vengeance in their hearts and murder on their hands, and of foreseeable miracles and predictable rarities, and of how much is unknown of the known universe. Maggie leaves out how all of it pales in comparison to waking up next to her.

 

( _Not noticing, I went on talking to him for hours about how we had met and what there was to learn, all these ideas firing through my head like morning comets and daylight meteors… By noon I finished my version of the universe and all things that dwelled therein_.)

 

Alex Danvers.

 

Gravity isn’t as powerful as the pull she feels towards this woman and she can’t help but think of how easy it is to want to forget everything in the name of knowing Alex in her entirety.

 

She smells of lilacs and the pages of old books.

 

/ /

 

Earth 11- 1936

 

“So. The multiverse, huh?”

 

“Infinite worlds with infinite versions of ourselves.”

 

“Do you think we know each other in other worlds?”

 

“I can see it now-- Maggie’s and Alex’s running around chasing bad guys and taking names, inseparable in every world.”

 

Alex lets out a small laugh. “But seriously, do you think so ?”

 

“I’m not too sure, Danvers.”

 

“I’d want it to be that way.”

 

“Yeah?”

 

“Does that scare you?”

 

Maggie grins, unafraid with the girl by her side. She shakes her head.

 

“So. Together in this universe and the next, huh?”

 

Maggie hooks her pinky through Alex’s in a silent promise.

 

“In this universe and the next.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> And that's that! All quotes in the fic are from "Illusions" by Richard Bach, which is an amazing novel, go read it if you have time. I've recently just started writing fanfic, so if any part of this sucks, I blame my lack of experience. I've got a Hogwarts AU too if anyone's interested in that. I'm over at Tumblr @superxbat, come and say hi.
> 
> Thanks for reading and have a nice day :)


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